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Good morning, everybody. Damian right here with an in-depth preview of a sure annual biotech convention, a take a look at the reducing fringe of weight problems drug improvement, and 12 months’s first IPO submitting.
The necessity-to-know this morning
- Eli Lilly issued an “open letter” warning towards using its GLP-1 medicine Mounjaro and Zepbound for “beauty weight reduction.”
- A choose beneficial the dismissal of a defamation lawsuit filed by Cassava Sciences towards two neuroscientists, Geoffrey Pitt and David Bredt, who had petitioned the FDA to halt the event of the corporate’s experimental Alzheimer’s drug.
- It’s a giant morning for “2024 company replace” press releases from biotech firms — too many to checklist right here.
Your information to #JPM24
Will there be offers? Why is Nvidia right here? And might biotech’s good vibes survive?
We rounded up all of the burning questions heading into the 2024 iteration of the J.P. Morgan Healthcare Convention, which begins Monday in San Francisco. That features a checklist of the company displays which may really be attention-grabbing, a take a look at how enterprise capitalists are feeling concerning the new 12 months, and the way the specter of a pugilistic FTC would possibly forged a shadow over the entire affair.
Learn extra.
And talking of JPM, beginning Sunday, this article will develop into your one-stop supply for all of STAT’s reporting from the convention, delivered to your inbox every afternoon.
A gentler strategy to genome modifying
CRISPR genome modifying, for all its utility, depends on reducing into strands of DNA, a prospect that may restrict its advantages for sure illnesses and result in problematic off-target edits. Feng Zhang, the Broad Institute’s resident CRISPR pioneer, co-founded an organization to push ahead a much less violent strategy to tinkering with the genome.
As STAT’s Allison DeAngelis studies, the corporate known as Moonwalk Therapeutics, and the concept is epigenetic modifying. The place most genome modifying applied sciences are aimed toward DNA itself, Moonwalk is focusing on the encircling chemical compounds that influence gene expression, crafting medicines which may change genes on and off with out making everlasting modifications to DNA.
Amongst Zhang’s co-founders is Alex Aravanis, who helped begin the blood testing agency Grail and can function CEO. The corporate’s funding syndicate consists of Alpha Wave Ventures, Arch Enterprise Companions, and Khosla Ventures.
Learn extra.
Novo is in search of weight-loss medicine on the innovative
Novo Nordisk, maker of the blockbuster weight problems remedy Wegovy, has a long-term imaginative and prescient of revolutionizing the remedy of metabolic illness. Getting there’s going to require turning some speculative science into efficient medicines.
In weight problems, which means turning to genome modifying. Novo stated immediately that it has partnered with Omega Therapeutics, a Flagship Pioneering firm, to develop a novel remedy that may manipulate an individual’s DNA to successfully flip up the warmth and burn vitality, thereby resulting in weight reduction. In MASH, the prevalent, obesity-related liver illness, Novo is working with one other Flagship startup known as Cellarity in quest of a small-molecule drug.
Every deal is comparatively small, including as much as a possible $1 billion if each firms hit sure milestones. However every provides to Novo’s rising mosaic of potential medicines which may succeed Wegovy and Ozempic, together with RNA-based therapies, cannabinoid-targeting therapies, and medicines designed to protect muscle mass throughout weight reduction.
Learn extra.
The primary check of 2024’s IPO waters
Final 12 months’s biotech rebound introduced a lift in dealmaking, positive factors for biotech shares, and some large enterprise capital rounds for newfangled startups. However IPOs, an integral a part of the trade’s monetary ecosystem, received left behind in 2023, which noticed the fewest biotech firms go public in a decade.
We’ll quickly discover out whether or not 2024 might be completely different. First up is CG Oncology, which filed its IPO paperwork with the SEC yesterday. The corporate, headquartered in Irvine, Calif., is in Section 3 with a remedy for bladder most cancers, enrolling sufferers who’ve already tried the usual of care. The drug, known as cretostimogene, is CG’s solely pipeline asset.
CG doesn’t precisely have the markings of a bellwether biotech IPO. The corporate, which raised a $105 million crossover round in August, has few of the trade’s name-brand VCs amongst its main shareholders consists of, however its success or failure going public will present a doubtlessly instructive datapoint in a 12 months that’s prone to see many extra startups trying IPOs.
